This global cooling we’re obviously experiencing means we had a pretty dismal spring, but summer so far has been rather splendid. Tonight was exquisite, and there were dragonflies around Crystal Lake.

I love dragonflies. They look sort of like little airborne Viking ships, and they search and destroy mosquitoes. That’s my idea of a good neighbor.



Mitch Berg over at Shot In the Dark memorializes the charge of the First Minnesota Regiment at Gettysburg, July 2, 1863. It was one of the most remarkable battle actions in history, but it suffers in memory because it happened the same day that Joshua Chamberlain and his Vermonters* had that little dustup you saw in the movie Gettysburg.

I was a corresponding member of the First Minnesota reenactment group back in the ’80s, but I was unemployed at the time and unable to buy equipment and so become active. It was my destiny to be a Viking, and I guess that’s for the best. For one thing, it’s more authentic to be a fat Viking than a fat Civil War soldier.

Ever argue with somebody about homosexual marriage? Then you’ve heard the question, “What harm does it do to your marriage if two men or two women get to enjoy the same institution?”

This is, of course, a diversionary tactic. Obviously nobody’s going to break into your home and force you to become a sodomite. (Not right away, anyway.) The effects on individual families will happen over a long period of time. The immediate effects will be on your ability to do business and to practice your religion freely.

Think I’m being alarmist? Read this column from Patrick McIlheran in the Milwaukee Journal (link from Feddie at Southern Appeal). And don’t think it’s just businesspeople who’ll be forced to violate their consciences. It’ll be church schools and charities and parachurch organizations too. The churches themselves will come under the hammer a little later, but it’ll happen.

Note in particular the comments below the column. Notice how people are saying, in essence, “Homophobes are bad, and bad people ought to be punished.” That’s what liberal openmindedness has sunk to: “I believe in freedom of conscience for all people, as long as they agree with me. If they disagree with me, of course, they’re wicked and must be purged.”

This election matters, because judges matter. Don’t kid yourself about that.

Meanwhile (now that I’ve depressed you sufficiently), enjoy Independence Day!

*Correction: Should read “Maine.” Thanks to Bill for the heads-up.

When the church body serves the organization instead of the other way round.

I did not know this man, and I’m sure it my loss. Denny Denson, a pastor in Franklin, Tennessee, for several years, has gone home to the Lord at age 68. He had been a Black Panther in the 70s and left it behind in ’79. Since then, he founded several non-profits and became a pastor.

One of his friends said, “Denny did have a gift of being able to encourage the leadership around him to step up. We realize that it’s impossible to fill Denny’s shoes. We’ve got to step up in our own way.”

Another friend said this:

“Denny Denson had an impact on my life in small ways and in profound ways. I met Denny 12 years ago through the Empty Hands Fellowship,” Bousquet said. “I was in awe that he was a member of the Black Panthers. I once told him I wished I was older so I could have participated in the civil rights movement, but he quickly shattered my idealistic dreams by sharing what a rough time it was.

“I love a quote Denny said that exemplified his life, ‘When nobody stirs up the pot, those at the bottom gets burned,’” Bousquet said. “Denny was always an advocate for the poor and the marginalized in our society. He was the founder and architect of Hard Bargain Mt. Hope Redevelopment. It was so important to him to preserve and revitalize this historic neighborhood because it is a significant part of Franklin’s history. His passion for workforce housing in our community was contagious. He cared deeply for low-income families and sought to be an advocate and a part of the solution to this titanic problem in Franklin.”

Last Thursday, I mentioned the blog on visiting various churches, made a crack about visiting a Lutheran church, and what do you know but he visted a Missouri Synod Lutheran church yesterday. He avoided the snakes too–a double blessing.

Tony Woodlief is quoting Dorothy Sayers:

Apart from a possible one per cent of intelligent and instructed Christians, there are three kinds of people we have to deal with. There are the frank and open heathen, whose notions of Christianity are a dreadful jumble of rags and tags of Bible anecdote and clotted mythological nonsense. There are the ignorant Christians, who combine a mild gentle-Jesus sentimentality with vaguely humanistic ethics–most of these are Arian heretics. Finally, there are the more or less instructed church-goers, who know all the arguments about divorce and auricular confession and communion in two kinds, but are about as well equipped to do battle on fundamentals against a Marxian atheist or a Wellsian agnostic as a boy with a pea-shooter facing a fan-fire of machine-guns.

Note commenter John M point about devotional life vs. service. This is all too convicting.

A man I grew up with is blogging about his visits to various churches in our area. He’s a thoughtful guy with many good observations. When he talks about going to his parents’ church, he’s talking about my church. Will he make it to a Lutheran church one of these days? I don’t know. People have to draw the line somewhere, and what with all the snake-handling going on there . . . 🙂

The Conservative Intelligencier points out a report on National Geographic’s Gospel of Judas. As you might expect, it is not as it appears, but I must ask what would it matter if it was as it appeared. What if a manuscript from 150-200 AD said Judas was a hero with noble motives? Would it really change anything? It would be fiction, even if old fiction.